An apheresis instrument is used to separate blood components from whole blood. Such apheresis instruments are commercially available from various sources, including the Amicus® instrument and the ALYX™ blood processing system which are available from Fenwal Inc. of Lake Zurich, Ill. Such instruments, also known as “separators”, typically separate a selected blood component from whole blood by passing the blood of a donor through the instrument to separate one or more blood components from the whole blood. The remainder of the whole blood is then returned to the circulatory system of the donor. It is, therefore, an extracorporeal blood component collection process.
The Amicus instrument utilizes a centrifuge to separate blood components. A disposable apheresis kit is connected to the Amicus instrument for collection of the desired blood component. The instrument has pumps, clamps, and valves that move and direct donor blood through the kit. Part of the kit includes a bag into which the desired blood component is collected. Most of the remainder of the kit is disposable after completion of the collection process. Such kits are often referred to as “disposables”.
As background, the Amicus instrument has had a platelet yield estimator. The operator of the Amicus device can decide to collect plasma and/or red blood cells (RBC) in addition to platelets. The operator enters information concerning the donor, such as platelet precount, mean platelet volume, donor weight, donor height, donor hematocrit and gender. If no information is entered for any one of these factors, a default value is used. The operator also enters the desired platelet yield, such as a single dose, a double dose or a triple dose collection. The platelet yield estimator then estimates the whole blood to process, platelet post count, post hematocrit, and the subsequent amount of time required for a blood product collection procedure, including for collection of multiple platelet products. If the time required for the entered procedure, platelet post count, post hematocrit, or the whole blood to process is outside a desired limit, the operator will revise the targeted products to be collected until the procedure time, platelet post count, post hematocrit, or whole blood to process falls within the acceptable limit.
However, the efficiency of the blood collection process can be enhanced if the operator of the apheresis instrument could select the type of blood component to be collected from a display or listing of all potentially available collection choices.